Look Up, Look Down #2

Much of what I started doing about this time (2013-14) started focusing more on imagined detail. I say imagined since I mostly don’t work from photographs or directly from life. The drawings in this series involve the often overlooked, seemingly insignificant detail. These are things that in a well manicured environment would be eliminated. Since I live on a ranch, that would be ridiculous. I like looking down and seeing twenty or more different types of plant often in a single square foot of ground.

Since as I said the work is not from life the process involves discovering the painting in the process of doing it. I rarely plan out the finished work. I just start drawing. The best work comes when I can shut up the inner commentary and just let it happen. Things rarely happen smoothly and the completion of the work is often an act of faith; the belief that something will evolve from the process. It’s rare that I ever give up on something, knowing that it sometimes just needs to be put away. Often the fight is trying to preserve something that you like that keeping other things from working. Sometimes it’s worth it, but rarely.